TAMPA — After almost a year, the Bay area's water shortage order has been lifted.

The Southwest Florida Water Management District's decision came this week after Tampa Bay Water reported a replenished regional reservoir due in part to the storms we've had this hurricane season.

All of the district's 16 counties have been moved to standard year-round restrictions, which allow for twice-a-week watering.

The regional reservoir figure at midnight Wednesday was 14.71 billion gallons.

Warren Hogg, chief science officer with Tampa Bay Water, presented the good news to District officials on Tuesday.

“It’s a whole other ball game right now," Hogg said. "We went from a low of 2.28 billion gallons to full in less than three months.”

The reservoir started to pick up in August when Debbie dropped several inches of rain on the area.

Overflow from rivers like the Hillsborough and Alafia continued through the rest of the summer and early fall, to the point where Tampa Bay Water had to let water out ahead of Hurricane Milton.

Hogg did say, however, that just because you can water your yard more often doesn't mean you should.

“Your lawn just got a foot of rain last week," he said. "You probably don’t need to water for awhile.”

Citrus, Hernando and Pasco counties, along with the cities of Dunedin, Long Boat Key and Tampa are still limited to one day a week because of local ordinances.